


Only Idgits Follow Strange Noises

by lopingloup



Category: Supernatural, Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: AU, Angst, Blood and Violence, Constance Clootie is her own warning, Fear of Death, Gen, Imprisonment, Near Death, POV Sam Winchester, Protective Sam Winchester, Sam is seventeen and Constance makes a couple borderline sexual remarks, Supernatural AU - Freeform, Taunting, Torture, Whump, Young Sam Winchester, blink and you miss it - Freeform, but not explictly, magical whump, set down a well, stuck down a well, wing whump, wynonna earp au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:41:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25147888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lopingloup/pseuds/lopingloup
Summary: Sam Winchester is the newest Winchester heir in Purgatory. When he comes of age, it'll be his life's mission to rid the town of the demons that infest it. In the meantime, there's weird noises coming from down the well at the end of his yard, and Sam's never been accused of having a lack of curiosity.
Relationships: Bobby Singer & Dean Winchester & Sam Winchester, Castiel & Sam Winchester, Constance Clootie & Castiel, Constance Clootie & Sam Winchester
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	Only Idgits Follow Strange Noises

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AnOddSock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnOddSock/gifts).



> Happy birthday to Socks!! Here's my attempt at some spn/wynonna crossover whump since you got me hooked on Wynonna like catnip,, you're the bestest friend anybody could ask for, love you *runs away* :D <3
> 
> In this, Castiel is a weird mash-up of Doc Holliday and Castiel from SPN, where he looks like Cas, but has Doc's life experience and sort of background. Idk at this point, he's kind of an OC xD Also, this was meant to be like, 5k tops, but it got infected with plot and now look where we are. At least I snuck it under 10k :3
> 
> Warnings (small spoilers): This is set down a well. I don't know the word for it, but if you're not keen on reading about people being in small spaces underground, please skip this! Nobody does any falling down the well, though.

Sam had never been normal. Not before the demons returned, and certainly not after. When he was small, Bobby told him that the soft voice he heard out in the yard wasn’t real. When there was screaming out in the night, Bobby told them it was unnatural things making them noises, and they should be left alone. He told Sam not to go following people with the burning eyes, or talking to them, or looking at them.

Dean couldn’t see ‘em but Sam could. Dean could mess around at school, flirting with anyone who gave him bedroom eyes, playing at being popular until everyone almost forgot he was a Winchester; Sam didn’t forget. At school, he’d stayed in the library and buried his nose in research, reading books on the unnatural ‘til his eyes crossed. If his face was six inches from the page, there was no chance of accidentally meeting the hellish eyes of something that wanted him dead, staring at him from across the room.

Sam was seventeen and done with school. Maybe… maybe when it was over, when all the demons were dead, he could read books that weren’t about killing things, find someone who didn’t know who he was, and go places previous Winchester heirs were too busy killing monsters to visit. ‘Til then, he saw no point in school.

Bobby’d tried weeks ago to make him go, but he was done arguing with Sam. He was round front, messing with cars like he and Dean did, getting as lost in their broken engines as Sam did in books.

Coming back from a run, Sam nodded at Bobby and went round to the backyard to cool down. He’d taken up running soon after his daddy died and Dean joked that he hadn’t stopped since. Sam figured when the time came to take on a town full of demons, being able to run pretty fast would be handy more than half the time. Though whether he’d be running after demons or away from ‘em depended on how good his training had been.

Out in the yard, the sun was hot enough overhead to bake the sweat off him almost as soon as he’d sweated it and he twisted the hose on, filling his mouth with tepid water and splashing it over his head before shaking off like a dog.

Some kind of noise or movement, or just a _sense_ of something behind him, made him twist around and freeze rigid. There was nothing. The grassy yard was empty save the hot breeze idling through, various bits of car junk scattered round about, and the old stone well over by the fence, though daddy’d boarded that up back when they were little and ‘acting like racoons; trying to get into everything’.

Sam switched the hose off and listened again, but he couldn’t hear anything. If he couldn’t see it, it likely weren’t trying to hurt him, and therefore didn’t need fighting. Except, as he was doing his stretches, he could hear a soft humming coming from off to the right, behind him. Not a machine’s droning hum, but melodic. It was so quiet as to be almost inaudible, yet impossible to mistake as just being the wind. The yard was still empty and Sam thought of all the dumb horror films his brother threw popcorn at when the idjits went off into the dark, following strange noises like that was ever a good idea.

But it was broad daylight and Sam wasn’t a college kid who’d never heard of a salt and burn, and he’d shot a human-looking creature between the eyes by the time he was fifteen, when a couple demons got mad and couldn’t wait for Sam to come of age like they was supposed to. Bonus was, by breaking the rules, they weren’t coming back even after Sam died and a new heir sprung up like a persistent weed. But the feeling of being a kid and knowing that he weren’t safe even when he was supposed to be, had never worn off and never would.

The humming drifted in and out and Sam went to fetch a towel to dry his face, and Peacemaker, ‘cus if it was a demon luring him out, he wanted to give the demon a proper greeting. Gun in hand, he followed the humming across the yard towards the fence. The noise was difficult to pin down, seeming to come past him on the wind, and also from somewhere below. He paced slowly around, warily moving around bits of rusted car metal since getting tetanus wasn’t on his to-do list for today or anytime. He finally found himself looking down at the boarded up well.

Sam didn’t know when the thing had been built but it was old, and, according to Bobby, dry as burned bones. Kneeling down to put his ear to the cracked wood seemed like an idiotic thing to do, but sometimes Sam got sick of being told to ignore things that made him curious and so he put his head to the wood.

The humming was marginally louder, reverberating up from the well’s depths and Sam jerked his head back, pointing Peacemaker at the wooden covering like something might burst up anytime. Except Sam had a bad feeling that whatever was down the well had been there longer than Sam’d been kicking. He’d been hearing quiet voices and occasional, muffled screaming from the yard since before his daddy died, he’d just been ignoring them. Like every other weird thing in this place, he’d figured it was best not to look too hard. He was looking now.

“Damn it.”

~

He might’ve been stupid enough to go down a well in pursuit of strange noises, but he wasn’t stupid enough to do it alone. Instead, he spent the time it took for Dean to finish school and amble home prying the old boards off the well with a crowbar. And when Bobby got curious about the banging and Sam’s absence, Sam told him the truth.

Bobby adjusted his battered cap on his head and wiped his forehead on the long-sleeved shirt he was wearing, though it was hotter than hell out. “That sounds like a damn fool idea,” he said. Sam shrugged.

Bobby came up closer to the open darkness of the well and, hand on his weapons belt, peered down.

“Hey!” he called, sudden enough to make Sam startle. His voice echoed against the old stone.

“What’re you-” Sam protested in a hiss.

“Anyone down there?” Silence. Bobby turned to lift his brows at Sam. “Ain’t nothing but dirt and snakes.”

Sam clenched his jaw. “I heard something, I know I did.”

Bobby shook his head. “If you did, then its an even worse idea. Just leave it be.” He gave Sam a stern look before strolling back over to his cars, leaving Sam alone with the well.

When Dean got back, he said much the same, before adding, “But I’ll watch’ya go down if you like.” He shrugged. “Got nothing better to do.”

Sam grinned. He’d gotten rope and a flashlight, and he had his regular knife on his belt and the one in his boot, plus Peacemaker, obviously. Sam was pretty damn sure there was something down there. He didn’t think they, _it_ was demonic, but if it was, he’d have it covered.

“How deep d’you reckon it is?” Dean was staring down the well. His hair was stuck up like porcupine spines with too much gel, though the carefully sculpted spikes were drooping in the heat.

Sam fetched a stone and came over to stand beside Dean as they looked down in the dark hole. Sam’s stomach twisted a little at the thought of going down there, seeing the light from above get smaller. He dropped the stone.

It disappeared into the black almost immediately and then, after a second, hit the ground with a _chink_ of stone against stone.

“Definitely dry.” Dean shot Sam a sideways grin. “’Least you won’t drown.”

Sam rubbed his sticky neck, feeling it burning under the red-hot sun. “Wouldn’t mind a dunking right now.” Dean huffed a laugh.

They got the rope braced against the sturdiest fence post a short ways away, Dean holding the other end, and Sam triple checked the knots around his waist.

“You drop me, Bobby’ll be mad.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “He’ll be madder at you for going down in the first place.” He paused. “Maybe I should be going down ‘stead of you.”

Sam shot him a look. “And get all the glory? No way.” He grinned briefly, before turning back to the well as he added more quietly, “’Sides, I’m the heir. Stuff like this is what I’m meant for.”

Dean grunted and muttered something under his breath that Sam was pretty sure wasn’t a compliment.

Sam rolled his shoulders. “You ready?” Sam stood on the well and tested his weight against the rope. The fence post didn’t creak or move and Dean nodded.

Easing himself over the well’s lip was the hardest bit and he was almost shaking with nervy anticipation, but he slowly managed it. Then he was almost suspended, hanging like a spider on a thread with his hands nervously gripping the well’s stone walls. His grip was pretty good, the well wall uneven enough to have foot and hand holds, though he was wary of some biting critter lurking in the cool cracks.

“You good?” Dean yelled, his voice muffled. He sounded strained.

“Yeah! Drop me down!”

In jerky spurts, that’s what Dean did. Sam tried to stop his entire weight hanging off the rope by clinging to the wall but it was tricky.

As the light receded above, Sam kept glancing down below him as he clung to the wall. But he was still dazzled from the light above and he couldn’t make out anything. He had a sudden fear that the well went on forever, before he sharply reminded himself that they’d heard the stone hit earth. But what if their rope wasn’t long enough and Dean couldn’t pull him back up again- Or if Sam got to the bottom and landed right smack on top of whatever weird thing had been humming-

“Shut up,” Sam hissed aloud, though the way his voice echoed around didn’t help his unease. He dug his fingers into the dusty cracks between the well’s stone wall as he descended.

“Sammy-” Dean sounded distant and breathless. “Can ya- see the bottom?”

“Not yet!” Sam called back, before cringing at the volume. His voice bounced around the walls and he felt like a target. Anything down below him knew he was coming now, if they hadn’t already.

Sam kept carefully climbing down, his shoulders and forearms shaking from gripping the gritty stone, and he’d grazed the back of his hand on a particularly sharp rock.

Still, when he glanced back over his shoulder, he swelled with relief to see the darkness solidifying into solid ground. And, though he’d been burning with curiosity, he was monumentally relieved to see nothing but rock and dirt at the well’s base, rather than some creature hunkering down there. When he looked back up the well, he felt sick to his stomach and his mouth was cotton-dry as he swallowed. He was a freakin’ long way down.

Sam’s trembling legs finally touched down and he sagged to the rocky ground, rubbing his sweaty, dusty hands on his jeans with a shiver. It was cool down here, probably pleasantly so if you weren’t worrying about getting out again, or that something might be down here with you. It was hard to make out in the dim light, but Sam couldn’t see anything, supernatural or otherwise. Once he was over his initial relief, the realisation was a disappointment. Maybe he’d risked this for nothing and Bobby was right. Nothing but dry rocks.

Way up above, Dean’s head appeared over the well’s edge; just a dull blob against the bright light that Sam had to shade his eyes against as he looked up.

“Alright Sammy?”

“Fine,” Sam said. Though the well seemed empty, his wariness made him speak quieter this time, trusting that the well’s acoustics would carry his voice up. The well looked empty, and it was small enough that he could’ve reached out both arms and touched the sides, and his arms still bent at the elbow. He had Peacemaker in hand already, even as he was digging his flashlight out of his pocket. The thing was small but powerful and flicking the switch on made him squint.

He swung it around the well, first on the ground as he checked for snakes, and then round at the walls. Maybe the humming had been from someplace else, and not the well at all, though he could of sworn it’d gotten louder when he put his ear to the boards. ‘Course, then it’d stopped and he hadn’t heard it since. Maybe it was heat stroke making him hallucinate.

But even as he tried to reason with himself, Sam was damn certain what he’d heard had been real and it’d come from down here. Maybe it was a ghost, then. Something intangible.

“Oh shit.” His eyes went wide and he crouched for a better look, tugging on the rope.

“Sam?” Dean’s voice called down from above. “The hell are you doing down there?”

Right down by the well base, such as it was, there was a grate in the wall. Like an air vent, except actually more like prison bars. Scanning the ground again with his flashlight, Sam dropped himself down on the sharp grit and gingerly, keeping his face away from the bars in case something came through, Sam lay on his side and shone his light through the grate.

He heard something and froze. Maybe a breath, maybe a hiss, maybe just a shifting of the air as something or someone moved silently, but he’d definitely felt it. Yet, he couldn’t really see much, even with his flashlight. There was definitely a space behind the grate, and he reckoned it was a pretty large one, but the grate itself was only maybe two handspans off the ground and he couldn’t see much else beyond it than rock and floating dust specks under the flashlight beam.

“Sam? Hey? Y’hear me?” Sam winced at Dean’s voice.

“Be quiet,” he hissed. “I’m fine.”

“What?” Dean yelled back.

Sam groaned and gave up on being quiet. “There’s something down here! I need a shovel…and bolt cutters.”

There was a beat silence. “What’ve you found?”

“I don’t know. A bunch of metal bars.”

“Like…a prison?”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe it’s meant to stay put, Sammy.”

Sam scowled. _Bullshit_. “Just get it for me!”

With plenty of grumbling, Dean got him a shovel and the bolt cutters and lowered them on Sam’s rope, once he’d untied it. Sam’d felt a bit like someone at sea taking off a lifejacket, but they didn’t have any other rope that long.

From all the grousing, talking and muttering Sam could hear, he was Bobby was up there now alongside Dean. He was doubt tearing Dean a new one for not trying to stop Sam from doing stupid shit. Sam’d take full responsibility, once he’d figured this thing out.

First job was to dig and hack at the baked-hard ground and see how big this grate was, and that took long enough that Dean got bored and wandered off for a bit, leaving just Bobby’s head peeking anxiously over. He shone his big flashlight, the one practically the size of a car headlight, down on Sam on occasion, which either helped or blinded him, depending on where he was looking.

Digging was exhausting and Sam barely got a few inches down; it was clear the grate went down further, but that rock and dust had topped up the well since then. How long had that thing been there? And, if Sam’s suspicions were correct, how long had something or someone been trapped down here?

Still, Sam reckoned he’d cleared about enough dirt that if he breathed in, he should be able to shove himself through the gap. The grate was wide sideways, so his shoulders wouldn’t be a problem, just his ribs, probably, and his head.

He took up the bolt cutters and tilted his head at the bars. The metal was thick enough that if it’d been new, he wouldn’t have even tried to get through them, heavy duty though the bolt cutters were. But the bars were rusted a little where they’d gotten wet in winters gone by and Sam hoped that’d be enough.

Bracing one arm of the cutters against the wall, he strained to snap through the bars, one at a time, right at the top where they went into the stone. He got the first, then the second. The noise of them breaking was painfully loud down here, where the sounds had no-where to go.

As he was taking a breather, he heard that soft something of a noise again, though this time he was absolutely certain it was the sound of something moving on the other side of the half-broken grate. Scrambling back to the other side of the well, he snatched Peacemaker out of his belt and shone his flashlight into the gap he’d widened with his digging. There was still nothing but empty space and rock and dirt, far as he could make out with the dust he’d churned up.

“Hello?” he said softly, feeling like a first-class dolt. Silence.

It took him a while to settle his nerves before he started up again. For not the first time, he doubted whether this was a good idea, but his curiosity overpowered his unease.

It must have been another hour, or even two, before he snapped enough bars to open up a space he should be able to fit through. But first he needed to get his flashlight, stick his head through the cut-up grate and see what the heck was on the other side, before he started dangling his legs down blindly like bait on a hook.

“Sam!” It was Bobby and Sam jumped badly, his nerves stretched tight.

“ _What_?”

“You’re coming up now, son. You been down for hours.”

“I only just got the grate off!” Sam called back, though he kept an eye on the open hole near his feet as he replied. Didn’t want anything coming through and surprisingly him. His hand stayed on Peacemaker at his belt.

“You can go down again tomorrow, if y’have to.”

“I’m just lookin’!”

“Christ,” Sam heard Bobby spit. “Be careful!”

“Always am,” Sam said to himself.

He took a steadying breath before tightening his sweat slick fingers around his flashlight and crouched down to stick the light warily through the gap. He could see another wall, set back perhaps two meters from the grate.

“What the hell,” Sam muttered. Maybe this space had been built to store something illegal; Sam could hardly think of a better hiding place than down a dry well, though it’d be no good if it flooded during winter.

Sam wriggled forwards a little, wincing at the sharp edge of one of the cut bars dug into his shoulder, and shone the flashlight downwards, into the space.

“Shit!”

Eyes, there were fucking _eyes_ -

He tried to scrabble backwards, hissing as the cut off metal bars clawed at his skin. He had Peacemaker still in his hand, but it was on the other side of the grate and no goddamn use when those eyes moved and something came at him, moving with the speed of something completely not human.

Sam yelled out, screaming and kicking like a trapped wild animal. There was a rattling like metal on metal and the grinding of grit around his ears as he tried frantically to pull his body back into the well. But he wasn’t fast enough and hands- claws- grabbed his shirt at both shoulders and dragged him bodily through the grate.

He didn’t drop down far, but his arm hit the grit hard and his flashlight went flying, the bright little beam bouncing around the space before it rolled away, uselessly illuminating an empty corner.

Sam scrabbled back from whatever-the-fuck had grabbed him with a yelp until his back hit a wall, desperately relieved to find Peacemaker still in hand. He brought it up immediately, but he couldn’t see shit and if he fired the gun down in this enclosed cell, he’d almost certainly deafen himself.

“Stay- stay away from me.” His voice came out as a rough croak. His arm was throbbing from his fall and he was pretty sure it’d been cut up by the rock floor, but he hadn’t broken anything and, more importantly, he could still hold his gun.

The… thing seemed to be keeping still, and since Sam still couldn’t make out what the hell it was, he kept Peacemaker on it as he shuffled warily sideways towards his flashlight. He could hear, very muffled, Dean or Bobby’s voice yelling down from top of the well, but he was too focused on whatever had tried to claw the skin off him to pay much attention.

He grabbed the light and swung the beam round, only to stare. The creature hissed, lifting a chained arm to shade its eyes. His eyes.

“Fuck,” Sam said softly, as he lowered the flashlight beam a little. It was a guy. A guy with blue eyes and wings; real-life, freaking huge bird wings attached to his back. “What- who _are_ you?”

The man, or whatever he was, tilted his head. His eyes looked steady and ancient in his face, the colour of his hair impossible to tell with how much grit and dirt was in it, and his wings were the same.

“I am Castiel.”

Sam just blinked at him. Dean and Bobby were still yelling, and Sam shook his head, trying to clear his shock.

“You going to grab me again?”

The winged guy shook his head solemnly.

“Okay.” Sam cleared his throat and got to his feet. He’d moved slowly, checking for aches and pains as he got up, but Castiel still visibly flinched at the movement, his chains clicking. Sam shot him a startled glance. “Easy,” he said. “You’re no demon, are you?”

Castiel shook his head again.

“Then I’m not gonna hurt you.” Sam hoped he was telling the truth. He didn’t know _what_ this guy was, nor if he meant any harm to Sam or anyone else.

Sam gingerly moved over to the broken grate, which was just about higher than his head. Getting out was going to be a bitch. For now, he shoved his foot into a crack in the wall and tugged himself up high enough that his head was part-way through the grate.

“I’m fine!” he yelled up the well.

“Sam?!” Dean sounded incredulous, angry, and panicked all at once.

“What the hell were you doing screaming like that?” Bobby sounded spitting mad.

“I just- I fell.” He took a breath of the dusty, stale air down here. “There’s- I found… something.”

Silence. “Get your rope on and get back up here, stat!”

“I can’t do that, Dean.” There were protests from Dean and Bobby both.

“It is nearing night.” Castiel’s solemn voice startled Sam so that he almost lost his footing and fell down again. “You ought to take your leave.”

“Just- give me a minute!” Sam called up the well, before he lowered himself back down, turning to Castiel. “What d’y mean?”

Castiel’s blue eyes were heavy and sad, even as he stared at Sam without reserve. As if looking away might show Sam to be just an apparition. “She will be arriving shortly, and her wrath is not something a mortal is capable of withstanding.” His eyes dropped to Peacemaker, still in Sam’s hand, though it was now lowered to point at the ground. “Even a Winchester.”

Sam tensed. “You know me- us?”

Castiel regarded him before he sighed, suddenly seeming tired and human. “She will strip you of your life, and it will be little better for me, boy. You must leave.”

“Who’s ‘she’? Who do you mean?”

Castiel shook his head. “She is the Stone Witch. One day I will incinerate her, starting with her innards and working my way outwards.” His lips had twisted into a snarl that made Sam afraid for the first time since he’d seen Castiel’s face, but the loathing dropped quickly away into resignation. “But whilst I am burdened by these shackles, she does as she wills, for as long as she wills.”

Sam licked his dry lips, but couldn’t for the life of him think of what to say.

Castiel focused on Sam again. “What year is it?” His gaze flicked down to the flashlight in Sam’s hand with a faded kind of curiosity.

“It’s…2007.”

Castiel blinked. “I see.” He studied Sam a moment. “You must then be… Wyatt’s great grandson?”

Sam frowned as he tried to wrap his head around everything. “Just, just his grandson. You knew Wyatt?” Then, before Castiel could reply, “Wait, you’ve been down _here_ since Wyatt Winchester was alive?” Sam gaped, half fascinated and half horrified.

Castiel nodded. “Indeed you are correct, in both your conclusions.” He glanced sideways at the cut-open grate, mouth tightening. “It’s crucial that you take your leave, child.”

“I’m not a child.” Sam bristled.

The man glared at him, the feathers on his grimy wings twitching as he shifted. “You are lucky to be a child, unversed in the ways of evil-”

“I’ve seen plenty evil,” Sam growled.

Castiel narrowed his eyes. “Maybe so. The Witch’s evil is beyond that. Unless you desire to see yourself pulled into six different pieces tonight, you must go. Before she arrives.”

Sam shuddered. The air was even cooler down here and the sweat created by fear was quickly drying. “And what about you? What’ll she do to you?”

Castiel smiled humourlessly, just a twitch of his lips. “The same petty games she has played for aeons, honed on those whose misfortunes number greater than mine.”

Sam swallowed. “It was you, wasn’t it?” he murmured. “You I heard screaming, before my daddy boarded up the well.”

“It is past time for you to take your leave, boy.”

A rush of air behind Sam made him flinch away, towards Castiel and the grate. Castiel had shrunk back against the wall, looking suddenly small again, even with his wings.

A crooning, feminine voice rose up. “It’s a little late for that now, don’t you think?”

Sam swung his flashlight round and found himself staring into the face of a blond woman, her pretty dress making her savage grin uncanny. Wind stirred her hair, even though they were all down the bottom of a goddamned well.

“Go!” Castiel snapped. “Get out of here!”

The woman, the Stone Witch, Sam assumed, laughed in a sharp, mocking trill. “Now that’s just rude. I like the pretty boy right where he is.”

She threw out her hand before Sam could even think to get his knife from his belt. Her eyes glowed bright blue and Sam felt himself locked in place, flashlight slipping from his hand and falling to the grit, still illuminating Castiel and the witch hovering over him. He was seized up, utterly immobilised and useless. He couldn’t open his mouth, let alone call out to warn Dean and Bobby. As his muscles went slack, he felt wet warmth run down his leg, socking his jeans, and his face flushed.

“Dear Castiel,” the Stone Witch smiled, perfectly in control and clearly thrilled by it, “don’t you want to introduce me to your visitor?”

Castiel’s jaw was gritted, his gaze murderous. But he did as he was told. “Constance, this is…Sam. He meant nothing by coming down-”

Constance only had to lift a finger and Castiel’s mouth clicked shut.

“Isn’t this a nice surprise.” She paused, sniffed the air delicately and wrinkled her nose, before her predatory smile widened. “Oh dear, poor Sammy’s had an accident.”

Sam wanted to turn away, to hit her, to run, but he couldn’t do anything but glare, much as Castiel was doing. Castiel’s wings were twitching too, like he wanted to fly right out of there.

“Lovely as this is, boys, I do have an agenda to keep to. I can’t let every pretty thing I see distract me,” She glanced over at Sam in a way that made him want to gouge out her eyes, “as much fun as that’d be; I’d get nothing done, would I?”

Sam could very faintly hear Dean and Bobby calling. But Sam’d already freaked them out by screaming earlier, they probably wouldn’t get seriously worried about his silence for a while now. And by then it might be too damn late, for Sam and Castiel, and probably Dean and Bobby too, if this witch was as pettily, gleefully vindictive as Sam thought she was. _Fuck_.

“How’ve you been down here? Chilly, I bet.”

“One burning thought kept me warm.” The look in Castiel’s eyes was decades of hatred, all crammed tight.

The witch’s smile sharpened and she stalked closer, her balance perfect despite her heels. “You must get so lonely down here between my visits, I am sorry it’s been a while.” She put a sharpened fingernail under Castiel’s chin and Castiel’s cuffs chinked as he tried to pull backwards but just hit the wall. “I never forgot about you, dear,” she said, her soft voice making Sam’s skin crawl, “don’t go thinking that.”

She ran her nails through Castiel’s scruffy hair. “I get so busy, and I do like to savour our time together. Rushing something pleasurable is simply unsatisfying, don’t you think?”

Internally, Sam was panicking. He felt like the child Castiel had called him when faced with this power he couldn’t do anything about. She felt stronger than any magic he’d come across, demon or otherwise, and he was down here with nothing but a gun that wouldn’t work on her, and knives he was incapable of using. He didn’t even have any salt.

“Look at you,” Constance gloated over Castiel, “you’re more alive than I’ve seen you in years.” She clapped her hands like a little child and Sam felt ill with fear and anger, mixing like oil and water. “More afraid for the boy than yourself. You always did want to be the hero, but that was Wyatt’s job wasn’t it. Not Castiel John Holliday’s.” She smiled wolfishly. “No, you were the disappointment, the coward, the dullard. I waved freedom in front of you like a trinket, and,” She mimed reaching out, her face twisted with pleasure, “you snatched it up, betrayed all you were meant to stand for, just like that.”

Sam’s gaze flicked between them. Had Castiel really betrayed Wyatt somehow? Castiel glanced over at Sam, but his face was tensely unreadable.

Constance laughed in that tinkling way of hers. “I wonder, dear Castiel, how long would it take, before you volunteered for this boy to take your pain? Before you begged me to hurt him instead? A day? Two? A week, perhaps.”

Sam pictured putting a flaming hole between her eyes.

“Damn you to hell and below,” Castiel said quietly, his voice gravelly with open hatred. The witch smirked at him.

“Baby, hell would be paradise for a woman like me.” She put a finger to Castiel’s lips and he stayed still. There was so much hatred in his eyes, but his slumped shoulders and the way he hunched down, flinching when she moved, spoke of resignation and surrender. Physical fight had been crushed out of him, even if he still hated her in his mind, Sam could see that.

“Keep still, now. I wouldn’t want to take off any bits of you I couldn’t stick back on.” She laughed, before her mouth thinned into a pleased smirk. “It’s been too long since I let my hair down, and I don’t want to disappoint our audience.”

Sam’s breath hitched as she crooked a finger and the knife in his belt slipped out and flew up through the stale air and into her hand. She considered it, tested the sharpness until blood beaded on her thumb, and then licked it off.

She sent Sam a sickly smile. “Lovely weapon,” she crooned. “Crude, but nice and sharp.”

Sam stared at her, his heart thundering in his chest as he looked between her and his own knife, but she turned away to focus on Castiel, prowling forwards. Sam strained again to move, trying to escape being glued in place like a spider stuck under wallpaper. He managed to twitch a single finger and could’ve shouted out in triumph.

Constance trailed a hand over Castiel’s right wing, ruffling the filthy features. Looking down at her hand, she grimaced and wiped the muck off on Castiel’s already grimy shirt, which looked about as old as Castiel claimed to be, and then some.

“You used to groom these so nicely,” she murmured, “even after Wyatt’s son was cold in the ground. Now you’ve let yourself get filthy like a pig in the dirt. I’m disappointed, Castiel.”

Sam flexed his arm, trying to drag himself free of her clinging, suffocating magic. He still couldn’t open his mouth to talk, though at this point he was trying to avoid the witch’s notice. As she got more focused on taunting Castiel, Sam was slowly regaining motion in his fingers, curling them into his palms with a huge sense of relief.

Constance was still gloating over Castiel’s tense form, crumpled on the ground with his wings hunched up near his shoulders.

“If you can’t keep your wings clean, I will have to bathe them myself, and you won’t like that, Castiel.”

Sam, straining against her magic, felt his stomach lurch upwards like he might be sick when the witch put Sam’s own knife to Castiel’s right wing. When Castiel flinched from her harsh grip on his feathers, his chains clinked like dropped keys. Castiel’s eyes were wide.

“But we’ve got a visitor, so I’ll treat myself just this once.” Constance looked manic with sadistic excitement.

“I’ve spent three lifetimes dreaming of ways to kill you.” Castiel was rigid, and seemed to be tugging against the witch’s magic just like Sam was. Except, all of the witch’s focus was on him, and he didn’t seem able to lift a finger, even as she was clearly allowing him to run his mouth. From the way she smirked coldly, Sam guessed she enjoyed it. That Castiel was struggling at all gave Sam some hope. Maybe the witch’s prisoner wasn’t as beaten down as Sam had assumed.

Sam jumped when Constance suddenly twisted around to look at him. He’d been trying to bend his knee and he froze guiltily until her stare. But she seemed too high on control to notice that her magic on him had slipped.

“He’s pathetic, isn’t he?” she smiled toothily. “All riled up and nothing to do.” She turned back to Castiel and cupped his cheek almost fondly. “All your fire and fury would almost be convincing, darling, if I weren’t practically choking on your fear.” She latched back onto Castiel’s wing, ignoring how Castiel’s head twitched away from her involuntarily, the rest of him immobilised. Then she dug the knife point into the flesh under the feathers, until Castiel’s face was screwed up in pain and blood streaked down the white of his wing. He groaned, low in his throat, but didn’t scream. Sam tried not to think about the screaming he’d heard years ago, and what Constance must have done to make Castiel sound like that.

“Blood is so cleansing,” Constance was saying. “Cleanses all your sins, your _guilt_ , washes away all this filth your laziness let build up. You should thank me, Castiel.”

“I hope you rot in a ditch,” Castiel snarled.

Constance sighed, lifting her unbloodied hand to press a finger to Castiel’s cracked lips. Castiel’s jaw clenched, but he stayed quiet, either due to magic or fear-fuelled restraint, Sam wasn’t sure.

Sam had gotten his foot to move and, finally, his knee flexed forwards, scuffing the grit a little. Sam went motionless, afraid Constance had heard, but she was back to digging holes in Castiel’s wings and seemed to have forgotten Sam was there. Castiel hadn’t, and his eyes burned as he stared at Sam over Constance’s shoulder.

Her magic’s hold over Sam continued to wane as Castiel’s wing became almost saturated with blood, his already paper-white face turning a sickly grey. The sharpness of his loathing faded into pain and his head dropped down onto his chest. Constance was so enthralled by her torture that she only looked up from Castiel’s wing to study the pain on his face. When Sam did catch sight of her, she was nearly shaking with excitement.

Sam’s legs were starting to feel almost normal now, the numbness had mostly worn off. He could fully feel the disgusting wetness of denim against his skin, the cramping pain from being frozen in one place, and how cold he was. He tensed and relaxed, but couldn’t tell for certain whether his limbs would hold him up if he tried to pull himself entirely free of Constance’s web.

But Castiel was groaning, seeming on the verge of passing out, and Sam didn’t know how much longer it’d be before she either turned on Sam, or hurt Castiel irreparably. The only element Sam had on his side was surprise and the knife hidden in his boot. He absolutely couldn’t give her time to react, because one blast of her magic would be his end.

“No more flying for you, angel,” Constance was muttering, twisting Sam’s knife in Castiel’s bloodied wing. Castiel cried out, sharp and agonised. “Not once I’ve bathed you in blood, just as you deserve.”

Sam, painfully slowly, began to inch his hand down his leg, towards his boot. One chance, just one. Cold as he was, he was sweating with fear and his hands were shaking. Constance’s magic still pushed against his chest, pinning him there, but he hoped, he prayed, that if he shoved against it hard enough, he’d be able to tear free.

With his hand as close to his boot as he could manage, he tensed to risk everything on an attack, glancing up one last time at Castiel’s painfully pale face, his blue eyes wet with pain and his forehead crumpled. But though Castiel’s eyes were half-closed, he met Sam’s gaze and his look burned. Sam couldn’t read whether Castiel was urging him on or trying to tell him something, but there was fire in that look.

Constance noticed the direction of Castiel’s gaze and Sam’s hand was forced. As she began to turn around, Sam stretched down to grab his knife and, with a cry of pain and desperation and sheer exertion, tore himself free of Constance’s magic.

Lurching forwards, he buried his boot knife in her chest, under her collarbone, and the witch rocked backwards on her heels, the breath stolen from her. But the little knife would barely slow her down and, acting on desperate instinct, Sam snatched his larger, already bloody, knife from Constance’s slackened grip and drove that one into her chest too, right below the other one.

Sam sobbed as he stabbed her, and this time Constance shrieked, loud and panicked, before stumbling backwards to half-collapse against the wall with a moan.

“Little…bitch,” she snarled.

Sam fought nausea as he looked at the blood on his hands. It was mostly Castiel’s, from the knife’s blood-slick hand, rather than Constance’s. But he’d never killed like that, up close and- Sam staggered sideways and threw up, his ears ringing loud enough that he didn’t immediately hear Castiel wheezing his name.

“-that most certainly won’t hold her. Winchester! Get yourself together, I’m the one bleeding. You must release me-”

“Okay, yeah, okay.” Sam swallowed down bile and forced his shaking legs to move as he headed over to the grate and struggled to lift himself up the wall. When he reached through the grate, the bolt cutters were just out of reach and he grit his teeth. The burst of frustrated irritation gave him enough energy to drag himself further up by an inch and grab the cutters.

Getting Castiel free was harder. Magic had preserved Castiel’s chains so that they were as secure as the day they’d been made, whenever that’d been, and Sam panted as he strained and struggled to force the already blunted bolt cutters through the metal chain.

“Fuck!” he yelled as his grip slipped and the cutters fell to the grit with a thud. Sam kept looking over at Constance, afraid that he’d find her standing behind him, whole again and laughing. Her eyes were half-open and she was panting, but for now she stayed down, glowering at them both. She was clearly devoting her magic to keeping herself alive, rather than killing them both in some awful, agonising way.

“Can you try?” Sam looked pleadingly at Castiel. He was white as death, with his wings caked in clotted blood, but he was still inhuman. An angel even, maybe. And Sam was exhausted. He’d dug grit until his shoulders ached, and then strained himself cutting the metal bars; he didn’t have the energy left for this, not after he’d put everything into breaking free from Constance’s magic. “You’ve got to be stronger than me, surely.”

“I regret to tell you that I cannot,” Castiel said, low and exhausted. “Nothing I do will break those chains. It must be an outside party, and you have the bad fortune of being the only one at my disposal.”

Sam shook his head, managing a tiny smile, as grim as he was feeling. “Alright.”

So Sam tried again, and again. He braced the cutter against the grit, as he’d done before, and made sure the chain was wedged right down. The harsh snap of cutting through the one chain made Sam want to whoop with relief, but he didn’t have the time to spare, and he moved straight onto Castiel’s other chain.

That one was cut more easily, to Sam’s vast relief.

“Her magic is weakening; you broke the circuit,” Castiel said. His exhausted eyes were dancing with something like triumph.

Since Constance was stirring, coughing up blood as awareness came fully back into her murderous eyes, Sam’d gotten Castiel free damn well just in time.

“Move.” Castiel didn’t wait for Sam to respond but pushed him out the way, so that Sam’s back hit the well wall with a thud.

Then, chains still hanging from his thin wrists, Castiel arched his wings as far as the cramped cell would allow and his eyes glowed as powerfully blue as Constance’s had, continuing to get brighter until Sam had to shade his eyes.

Castiel was speaking but it was in a language Sam’s brain couldn’t comprehend and, when he started to sicken and go dizzy, Sam screwed his eyes shut and clamped his hands over his ears. Even through his hands, he could hear Constance screaming. What was Castiel capable of? What exactly had Sam unwittingly released?

A cool, gentle touch at Sam’s wrist made him flinch, his eyes springing open instinctively. Castiel was stood in front of him, close enough that Sam’s breath stirred Castiel’s hair. Sam took an instinctive step backwards and he looked warily behind Castiel. Constance was slumped on the ground and Sam swallowed thickly. Her eyes had been burned out entirely, and her eyes, mouth, nose and ears had all bled.

Castiel suddenly staggered, putting a hand to his chest. It came away bloody. Sam stared. Blood was blooming across Castiel’s shirt in two blossoms; two wounds. Castiel’s face twisted, less in pain than anger, Sam thought. He turned to look at the fallen witch with loathing.

“The bonds she placed upon me have locked us together.” He suddenly looked terribly sad and looked up at Sam from beneath furrowed brows. “Let me see the daylight before I too go to meet the good Lord.”

“You’re going to die?” Sam said in a small voice.

Castiel smiled a tiny fraction, but it didn’t come anywhere near his bottomless eyes. Sam swallowed.

“Let’s get out of here. Maybe Bobby can help us.” Castiel said nothing, clearly at the very end of his endurance.

Getting Castiel out through the grate was incredibly difficult, with the wings on his back struggling to fit through the tight space. But Castiel was at least slimmer across the chest from his years of entrapment, and they finally got him through into the well. Sam grabbed his flashlight off the ground, silently thanking it for being so sturdy, before he dragged himself out of the cell with exhausted tenacity.

The rope still hung down the well and Sam wrapped his hand around it with a huge sense of gratefulness. In that cell, he hadn’t thought he’d get out alive.

“Dean!” he yelled. His arm was around Castiel’s back, holding him up, and every second that passed left the angel leaning more and more weight on him. “Bobby!”

“Sam!” Bobby’d gruff voice yelled out, and his head appeared over the edge of the well. Sam could have cried if he wasn’t so tired. “What in god’s name-”

“I found someone, you gotta pull him up! He injured, okay, we’ve got to hurry.”

A brief, shocked silence, before Bobby, true to form, rolled with the punches and set into action.

“Is he tied on the rope, then?”

Sam was just finishing the knots. “Yeah, he’s good. Be careful, alright!”

“Is he dangerous?” Bobby asked, but he’d already put tension on the rope in preparation for pulling the angel up.

“No,” Sam lied. “He just needs our help!” Well, that bit was true.

“What’s going on?” Dean’d turned up, and Sam smiled tiredly at the sound of Bobby ordering him around. Then Castiel was being slowly inched into the air and Sam felt a weight lift off his shoulders at the sight. Castiel had been stuck down here for god knows how long. He’d tried to protect Sam from the witch and almost entirely succeeded, sacrificing himself rather than remind Constance of Sam’s presence. Then he’d killed the witch and saved them both. Castiel might or might now be dangerous, but Sam owed him, and more than that, he respected the steely strength behind Castiel’s eyes. He vowed to do everything he could to keep Castiel’s wounds from being the end of him.

Sam watched tensely as Castiel got closer and closer to the edge of the well, and then was clumsily hauled over the edge. Sam winced at how the angel’s wings were knocked about, but he didn’t think Castiel was conscious to feel it.

The rope snaked back down after a long moment.

“Sam- is that a bona fide angel?” Dean sounded out of breath but beside himself with excitement. “For real?!”

Sam laughed. “Just get me out of here.”

With all of them exhausted, getting Sam out was harder. But between Sam tiredly trying to pull himself up the well wall and Bobby and Dean tying the rope to the fence post a couple times to get their strength and breath back, Sam finally emerged at the surface.

“Oh thank god,” he muttered, as he collapsed on the dust and stared up at the stars.

Dean and Bobby were bent over, gasping for breath, and Castiel was slumped against the well wall, his chin on his blood-smeared chest.

“Aw Christ,” Sam groaned. He had an angel’s life to save.

~

One week later

~

Healing Castiel took all of Bobby’s vast knowledge, a heap of luck, combined with Castiel’s iron determination not to let that witch take his life. The angel’s healing allowed them enough time to figure out how to fracture the bond Constance had wrought between them, intentionally or otherwise, and nullify it.

Once that was broken, Castiel returned to health at a rate that wasn’t even in the realm of human. Over two days, he came back to life like a video of dying flower played in reverse, with his stabbing and torture wounds sealing over, weight returning to his frame, and a healthy flush stealing over his skin. Healthy, Castiel looked like the kind of powerful, old testament angel who wrecked vengeance in the name of God. Sam was more than half in awe of him.

One evening, Sam found Castiel sat on the back porch, looking out at the setting sun and the landscape.

Sam sat down on the step. “How’re you doing?”

Castiel seemed somehow both relaxed and tense, with his forehead crumpled with some troubling thought, but his body slack.

At Sam’s voice, Castiel stirred as if waking and nodded to Sam. “I am alive, and that is the most important fact. Thanks to you, your brother, and the generous Mr Singer.”

Sam smiled a little. “You did the heavy lifting.” They were silent for a long moment.

“I imagined I’d feel different,” Castiel said, and Sam looked over, a little startled.

“How so?”

“All the rage I had… I had expected satisfaction, but now that I released it all,” Castiel sighed, “I feel as if there’s nothing left.”

Sam frowned. “Castiel, you’ve got a life to live. You’re free to go-”

Castiel tensed abruptly. “The last time freedom dropped into my lap, I abused it beyond reproach. I abandoned my duty and my good friend suffered for my sins. Freedom and I do not get along,” Castiel’s voice dropped as he added, “as much as I longed for it, all those years.”

Sam considered him silently. “It’s overwhelming,” he said finally. “Maybe you need a purpose. Going from a four-foot square cell to the whole damn world is a shift no-one would know what to do with at first. You got time, Castiel. More’n me and Dean and Bobby, even.”

Castiel cocked his head as he considered that, before turning his intense gaze on Sam, who struggled not to look away. “What about you, Sam? You are a fine man. What’d you seek to do, if duty didn’t have you leashed to Purgatory?”

Sam shrugged uncomfortably. “It’s just the job, Cas. I can’t think like that, dream about things being different ‘cus they’re not. Maybe… one day this’ll be done, but ‘til then,” he trailed off with a shrug.

Castiel was still looking at him. “You have given me plenty to think on.” He looked back out at the night and they sat there quietly long enough for the stars to come out fully, and the moon to steal the sun’s place in the sky.

Just as Sam was beginning to shiver and think of turning in, Castiel reached out and took his arm in a near-painful grip.

“Sam,” he said solemnly, “I failed your granddaddy and there’s no day I’ve been alive since that I don’t regret it. That guilt, it’s a burden greater than any chains the witch put upon me.” He released Sam’s arm, but his eyes stayed locked on Sam’s. “If you will permit me, and I hope to God you do, I need to make it right, with myself and with God. I will aid you in clearing this place of demons, just as Wyatt was so desperate to. On my life, there is nothing in this world I want more.”

Sam stuttered, not knowing what to say. “I- Castiel… are you sure? You don’t owe us, if anything I’m indebte-”

Castiel sat back. “I am certain, right down to my old bones.” He smiled, looking at ease for the first time. “I so swear, Winchester, I will make this right. Our freedom will have been earned together.”

**Author's Note:**

> Soooo, I don't know that I got the characters' voices too well at all, but I had a go. Let me know what you thought of the fic and whether you've seen Wynonna! (If you haven't, I hugely recommend it!)
> 
> Socks, I hope you liked it ok and have had a nice birthday <3


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